Prince of Darkness
by dragonallie23
Summary: A DracoGinny one shot song fic from the song The Prince of Darkness by the Indigo Girls. Ginny tries to accept the truththat peace is only a facade, and she may have to say goodbye to Draco forever. Rave reviews on MNFF! Read and review please!


**My place is of the sun, and this place is of the dark,**

She sat on the bed, legs crossed, head down. Wild, tangled, red hair concealed her pretty face, but the flames threw their burning light on her small, freckled shoulders. Her fingers twisted a piece of parchment while she sat there, defeated. Where he was going, she couldn't come.

**I do not feel the romance; I do not catch the spark.**

_His cool lips traced a path down her neck; his hands found hers and held them tight. She smiled, leaned in closer and gently kissed his forehead. _

"_I'm going to miss you," he murmured, "Promise you'll always shine for me, Red. I'm going to need a light where I'm going."_

"_Always," his lips found hers and fire and ice met. _

**I don't know when I noticed life was life at my expense**

**The words of my heart lined up like prisoners on a fence**

**The dreams came in like needy children tugging at my sleeve**

**I said I have no way of feeding you, so leave. **

A letter lay crumpled in her hands. The letters spoke of hope and confidence, but he was going down a tunnel; one which she could not see. Her heart was torn in conflict. She had dreams, hopes, and plans - yet here she sat, patiently waiting for her Prince of Darkness to come back to her.

She could no longer feed the fire in his heart. No longer could she burn bright for him in his darkest hour. Her dreams at night were like needy children, tugging at her soul. She wanted to follow a path of all her own. The tears never came, but the pain dragged on in heart.

**But there was a time I asked my father for a dollar**

**And he gave it a ten dollar raise**

**And when I needed my mother and I called her**

**She stayed with me for days. **

There was a gentle knock on the door and without waiting to be admitted, Hermione entered. She took one look at Ginny's tear stained face, then left without a word. She returned moments later with a tray of chocolate chip cookies, milk, and coffee.

She said nothing at first, but instead rubbed her comfortingly on her back as she waited for Ginny to speak.

"He said that he'd be back. He said that because dark is the absence of light that he would make it through, because I was his light. He went back to stop all the fighting and he said that he would be okay!" Her voice rose an octave or two as she fought the sobs.

"He believed that there could be peace in Britain again. He believed that everyone would welcome the new Wizarding government peacefully! Why did he have to go? Why did he have to be so selfless?" She pounded her pillow over and over again. Tears flowed freely and she finally gave in to her exhaustion and fell back down onto the bed. She closed her eyes as the salty taste filled her mouth. Hermione massaged her shoulders for her until Ginny fell into a state of calm.

"Why did he believe in the peace? Any fool could see that we are still at war with ourselves," she said bitterly.

Hermione said softly, "A thing is not necessarily true because a man chooses to fight for it." She laid a gentle kiss on Ginny's forehead and walked quietly out of the room.

**And now someone's on the telephone, desperate in his pain**

**Someone's on the bathroom floor doing her cocaine**

**Someone's got his finger on the button in some room**

**No one can convince me we aren't gluttons for our doom. **

Thoughts kept bothering her state of semi-consciousness. Why was she the one who had to be the one to choose? She felt like she was standing on the edge of a precipice–one voice kept telling her to jump and keep faith in her own wings, the other urging her to cross the bridge to safety.

Sanity was a lost friend to her now. There was no more room in her head for rational thought any longer. Ginny would stare and stare at his picture for hours upon hours: his white blonde hair combed back, grey eyes staring haughtily at her, his smile challenging. Hermione kept trying to tell her that he would come back one day, but no matter how long she stared at his picture–trying to drink up the details of his face–he kept fading into the backstage of her mind, while the turmoil and battle for his fate occupied her every waking thought. He had become less of a person and more of a memory that kept her awake at night.

He was an obsession at most. Hermione insisted that she come outside, go shopping, get some fresh air, but she kept her vigil besides his photograph at her bedside. Ginny tortured herself with things her loved most; his broomstick, his cat, his favorite sweater… It was a high unlike any other. She wanted more, she wanted him, but it had to stop.

**But I tried to make this place my place**

**I asked for providence to smile upon me with his sweet face,**

**Yeah, but I'll tell you…**

**My place is of the sun and this place is of the dark,**

**And I do not feel the romance I do not catch the spark.**

**My place is of the sun and this place is of the dark**

**By grace, my sight grows stronger,**

**And I do not feel the romance, I will not be**

**And I will not be a pawn for the prince of darkness any longer. **

She lay back onto her pillows and stared at the canopy above her. She stayed like that for six minutes until her alarm went off at exactly six thirty. Her arm flung out and hit the alarm. She rolled off the bed onto the floor and then walked over to the bathroom where she spent a full hour washing up and carefully applying make up.

The simplest tasks took on more meaning–curling her hair into gentle spirals and pinning them up was a job that needed the hearts of five men. Polishing her nails took the precision of a team of jewelers. Everything, everything, was painstakingly cared for and polished. She pulled her best dark blue dress robes carefully over her head and took her satchel up from the desk.

She looked in the mirror and carefully straightened her robes. There–now no one would know that she had spent the last four days crying. Ginny gave the mirror a weak smile and took a final deep breath before leaving her room for the first time in ten days.

She walked into the kitchen where Hermione and Ron were sitting peacefully at the table. Ron was wearing his gardening jeans and Hermione was wearing paint-splattered smock, suggesting that they were in the process of spring-cleaning. Ginny walked over to her brother and shocked them all by giving him a big hug and a peck on the cheek. She released him from her embrace and turned to Hermione to take her hand in hers.

"Thank you so much, Hermione." Ginny pulled her into a hug. She pulled back after a while and announced, "I'm off to St. Mungo's."

"Today is the day?" Ron asked gravely.

Ginny tried to smile. "Yeah, I think it is. Yes," she said firmly.

"Come here." She ran into his open arms and tried to hold back the tears that threatened to spill and muss her makeup.

"You're doing the right thing," he whispered into her ear.

"I know." She pecked him on the cheek again and after giving Hermione one last hug, walked out the glass double doors into the garden. Ginny walked until she was in the middle of a star that Hermione designed with stones with magical properties to deter Splinching (for Ron's sake of course; he never got the hang of Apparation,) and turned once.

She opened up her eyes to find herself in an alley way outside of Purge and Dowse, Ltd.

She stepped up to the dummy in the window and said, "I'm here to see Draco Malfoy."

The dummy nodded and beckoned. Ginny stepped through the glass and found herself in a very familiar place–St. Mungo's reception area.

She walked up to the dour-faced Welcome Witch and after rummaging through her satchel handed the woman her identification card, Draco's last will and testament, release papers and some other paper work.

The Welcome Witch just glanced at her identification card once before handing it back to Ginny, and then made short work of stamping and copying the rest of the paperwork. She gave Ginny back the originals, sent the rest winging through the air for filing, and gave Ginny more paperwork to give to the Healers.

"You need to visit the Healer's stations on all four floors to get tested for anything that might affect your better judgment on whether or not to 'pull the plug,'" the witch sneered. "After you are done, come back here with your bill of health and I'll verify and copy it. Then you can head over across the street to the new wing. Do what you need to do, and don't worry about getting the paperwork back to me. Healer–" she flipped through her papers "–Smethwyck will take care of that for you." She paused to hand Ginny a thick pack of papers and went back to her copy of _Witch Weekly_.

Ginny walked away to the first station on the ground floor and leafed through the papers as she waited to be examined. Shortly thereafter, a Healer in training came to quickly examine her and ask her a few questions. After she had papers from all four floors she handed them to the Welcome Witch and received a new stack of papers for her trouble. All alone and frightened at the prospect of the uncertain future, Ginny bravely made her way to her comatose lover's bedside.

**Maybe there's no haven in this world for tender age,**

**My heart beat like the wings of wild birds in a cage.**

**My greatest hope, my greatest cause to grieve**

**And my heart flew from its cage and it bled upon my sleeve.**

**Oh, the cries of passion were like wounds that needed healing**

**I couldn't hear them for the thunder.**

**I was half the naked distance between hell and heavens ceiling**

**And he almost pulled me under. **

His eyes were closed and his chest rose up and down with each breath he took. She held his hand in hers for a second longer, trying to count each weak heartbeat.

"_Here," he reached from behind her and helped her stow her cauldron on the top most shelf of the pantry._

"_Oh, thank you–" She turned around, a grateful smile on her lips. "Draco!" she shrieked happily. _

"_Where have you been? I've had no one to tutor me in Potions since you left."_

_He raised an eyebrow. "I missed you too."_

_Ginny blushed. "That's not what I meant. Of course you mean much more to me than just some one to teach me how to brew a Potion, you know that!"_

_His smile disappeared, he took a step closer to her. "Exactly, what do I mean to you, Ginevra?"_

_She could barely speak for lack of words. He was so close she could smell the faint trace of smoke on his robes._

"_I---you, um," she stuttered._

"_Don't talk." And he covered her mouth with his with a fiery kiss. Ginny wanted to melt into his arms; the butterflies in her stomach were going off like fireworks. Oh, this kiss… She felt lost in a world of ecstasy. How could she even imagine anything else was ever like this? Her hands moved up his chest while his fingers ran through her hair. She felt his heartbeat for the first time and a thrill went through her and she gasped._

_He broke the kiss gently. "I missed you," he whispered in her ear._

_Ginny looked into his eyes and murmured, "I missed you too." Then, with a mischievous grin she said, "I think that we have some more catching up to do." And with that she grabbed the collar of his robes and brought his mouth down to hers for another one of his delectable kisses. _

The Healer cleared his throat. "Ms. Weasley?"

"Yes?" Ginny murmured.

"Are you ready?"

"No, but I think he is," she said softly. Ginny held his hand even in a vice-like grip.

The Healer raised his wand, but Ginny stopped him. "Please, let me do it. I know it, from the war."

"If you feel that it is best," he said and he stepped back from the bed.

Ginny needed no wand for this spell; she had performed it all too often. Instead, she felt for the magic tying Draco to this world with her mind and concentrating on that bond intoned:

"_The time is near, the time is nigh_

_To answer the call, to answer the cry_

_Your head lies still, your body chills_

_Gently, gently close your eyes as_

_Death calls you from this place."_

The final heartbeat.

Ginny leaned over Draco's body and placed a final kiss on his lips. She got up, handed the papers to the Healer and walked out of the room. She kept walking until she got to the waiting room where she sat down by a window full of sunlight.

Ginny Weasley sat there, tall and defiant of the world that had so cruelly taken her lover from her, and started to laugh. Tears ran down her face, from happiness or sadness she did not know–it was all over now. She sat there for a few minutes; laughing and crying, rejoicing and mourning, holding on and letting go to everything. Hermione burst through the door of the waiting room and ran over to Ginny.

"I know you said that you didn't want us here, Ginny, but I _had_ to come, you don't understand–" she said worriedly.

Ginny cut her off. "It's all over." She smiled through the tears. "But you were right, Hermione. A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it. There is still a war going on. There cannot be any peace until Harry finally kills Voldemort. Voldemort has only disappeared and I think he's coming back one day. I _know_ he's coming back one day. This peace is a façade." She gazed out the window.

"But we'll be ready for it when he comes," she said firmly.

Hermione smiled. "We will fight when it comes time. Do you want to talk about _this,_ though?" Ginny looked at her shook her head.

'I'll be at the house if you need me, Gin." Hermione patted her on the shoulder and made her way out of the waiting room. Ginny turned back to the window and whispered, "We'll be ready."

**My place is of the sun and this place is of the dark**

**And I do not feel the romance I do not catch the spark**

**My place is of the sun and this place is of the dark**

**By grace, my sight grows stronger**

**And I do not feel the romance I do not catch the spark**

**(grows stronger)**

**By grace**

**(my place is of the sun)**

**My sight**

**(and this place is of the dark)**

**Is growing stronger**

**(I do not feel the romance)**

**I will not be a pawn**

**(I will not be)**

**For the prince of darkness any longer.**

**A/N: This story is dedicated to my friend who has recently had to say goodbye to her father for the last time. May he rest in peace and may she and her family find hope for a brighter future. **

**Muchos gracias to my beta, COLORES!**


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